Democracy Hub and 23 others, through their lawyers, have filed a motion at the Accra High Court asking the court to re-admit the alleged assault case against the Inspector General of Police (IGP) for prosecution to continue.
The High Court on April 9, 2024, struck out the alleged assault case against the IGP for “want to prosecution.”
They are therefore asking for a new date following the rescheduling of an earlier proposed date of April 4.
Timothy Selikem Donkor, one of the attorneys for the Democracy Hub, in an interview on TV3’s News Central on Friday, April 12, indicated that the court registry failed to communicate a new date for the case to be heard.
According to Selikem, the practice has been that “when a case is due for hearing and, due to some circumstances, the case was not heard, applicants can file for a hearing notice to be reissued to the parties in the matter.”
This allows for a new hearing date to be communicated to them, which is a usual practice.
However, the attorney revealed that the court did not sit on April 4, which he said was a vacation date for the court, and the plaintiffs were in court.
“In our case, on the 4th of April, which was a vacation date of the court, we were actually in court but the court did not sit. On that same day, we caused for a hearing notice to be issued, a letter was served on the registry of the court…but the date for the hearing was neither communicated to the applicants nor the respondent,” he said.
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“Then on the ninth [of April], our court clerk went to the registry of the court to find out why the delay, then she was updated on the fact that the case was struck out,” he stated, describing it as a rare practice of the court.
The lawyer for Democracy Hub—the lead organisers of the three-day protest in September 2023—blamed the court for not following the due processes before striking out the case.
#OccupyJulorbi protest: High Court strikes out alleged assault case against IGP
“The reason could be just mere incompetence of the court or inadvertence on the part of court workers, not per se indicative of any malicious intent,” said Elikem Donkor.
Through the #OccupyJulorbiHouse protest the youth of Ghana expressed their displeasure at the hardship, the rising cost of living, bad roads, an end to corruption, and other issues that make life unbearable.
The protesters maintained that they had been brutalised and assaulted by the police and took the matter to court, where they are asking for damages for the alleged assaults.
The protest, which took place from September 21 to 23, 2023, attracted both local and international attention. The police arrested a number of the protestors during the demonstration.
